VISUAL ART | REVIEWS
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SCULPTURE SENGA NENGUDI Fruitmarket Gallery, Edinburgh, until Sun 26 May ●●●●●
Prior to closing for redevelopment in May, the Fruitmarket hosts a survey show by the African-American artist Senga Nengudi curated by the Henry Moore Institute in Leeds. Now in her 70s, Nengudi is enjoying belated recognition after 40 years of work addressing themes of race and gender; 2017 saw her included in both the Venice Biennale and the Armory Show in New York.
In 1969, she set out to challenge the hard-edged geometric minimalism of the time with her ‘Untitled Water Compositions’, vinyl tubes filled with coloured water which look like giant ice-poles. They’re cheerful, tactile and have a sense of humour (something minimalism isn’t renowned for).
Nengudi’s sculptures often use materials which are hard to
preserve: water, sand, newsprint, nylon. ‘Sandmining’ is a recent work, sculpted on the floor in sand and pigment, referencing modernism and abstract expressionism. ‘Bulemia’ is a room covered with newspapers, referencing an artistic utopia she dreamt up with a friend, the pages selected for their positive messages – ‘the way we are’, ’empire in transition’, ‘family before fame’. In 1977, Nengudi began to make sculptures using tights stretched
and weighted down with sand to create anthropological forms. She says she liked the way the material mirrored the flexibility and resilience of the body – and being able to pack an entire exhibition in her handbag. These works are clever and quirky, managing to address themes of race and gender with the lightest of touches.
Her subsequent shift into performance was a natural progression and the remaining works here are photographs of the costumes and props she made for performances using rubber, paper, wire and (ubiquitously) tights. These works are ephemeral, but that doesn’t mean they’re not clever or profound. Nengudi’s work strikes a chord today with its themes, its materials and, perhaps particularly, its ability to retain its sense of humour. (Susan Mansfield)
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MULTIMEDIA ANNE-MARIE COPESTAKE Cooper Gallery, Dundee, until Sat 13 Apr ●●●●●
Dundee’s Cooper Gallery is the first public institution to host a solo show by artist Anne-Marie Copestake. Looking in either direction the whole street was filled with people, some singing, moving towards x . . . is an exploration of human communication in the everyday via sculptures, prints, installations and more. The site-specific works here came to fruition through Copestake’s research into loss, grief and the desire for recognition of unacknowledged lives.
'Sacks' is made up of three paper sculptures, presented alongside text which conveys everyday scenarios. Copestake sees language and images as intrinsic to the formation of a community where life is not experienced in solitude, and the sentiments expressed by the works are evidence of that. Audio is subtly incorporated throughout the
space, while videos play silently as a way to explore the fabric of language and notions of presence and absence. Her well-known video work 'Trigger tonic' is a series of recorded interviews between artists, emphasising Copestake’s preference for collaborative, communicative engagement. Ultimately, Looking in either direction . . .sees the artist take on a multimedia investigation into how we observe and respond to the world around us. (Arabella Bradley)
116 THE LIST 1 Apr–31May 2019
INSTALLATION KRIS LEMSALU: BIKER, BRIDE, BUILDER, BUSINESSWOMAN AND BABY Tramway, Glasgow, until Sat 13 Apr ●●●●●
There is a disaster in Tramway 2. The room is full of a choppy sea, upon which the wreckage of somebody’s life is floating. A flock of ceramic birds are frozen in the act of gathering up wave-like folds of blue fabric. This foaming disaster scene could be a personal tragedy. Or it could be a technicolour premonition in which the other creatures of the earth return to clear up the mess that humanity has left. For the opening night, Estonian artist Kris Lemsalu is present. In fact, she is screwed down to a wooden armature, keeping perfectly still in a scarlet robe. Her endurance holds much in common with the statue impersonators who populate Edinburgh’s Royal Mile. It’s difficult to suspend disbelief: ceramic birds can’t fly without strings and waves can’t crash without armatures to hold them up. There are few clues as to how and why this scene has been captured in suspense, but perhaps there is nothing to be solved. The situation here is too glamorous and colourful to be another re-imagining of the drab post-apocalyptic wasteland that has quietly embedded in our psyches of late. There is a considerately placed park bench overlooking this catastrophe. Why not sit down and just enjoy the spectacle? (Jessica Ramm)
GROUP SHOW DOMESTIC BLISS GoMA, Glasgow, until 31 Dec 2020 ●●●●●
Gallery 4 at GoMA has opened for the first time in a number of years for significant museum collection show, Domestic Bliss. The exhibition provides an exploration of domestic labour, feminism, public versus private space, intimate relationships and historical narratives.
Functional domestic objects like Niki de Saint
Phalle’s ‘Vache Vase’ – which at first looks more like a sculptural work – sits on a plinth painted to evoke a cabinet, placing emphasis on the object’s function in the domestic realm. The allusion to the domestic space is evident throughout the entire gallery space, with the addition of imagined interiors: a video shown on an old TV set with mid-century chairs to watch from, and a fireplace painted on the wall. A key theme of the exhibition is women at work: in the home and in the workplace. Photographs by Oscar Marzaroli show painter Joan Eardley working in her Glasgow studio, and two photographs by Jo Spence – ‘Early Mother’ (1985) and ‘Love on a Plate’ (1989) – present mother-daughter relationships by documenting the roles women are expected to play in society. Domestic Bliss is an exhibition about challenging the values of domesticity that society encourages us to emulate in our own lives, and certainly leaves you with plenty to ponder. (Arabella Bradley)